


Joke's on you

by FreeShavocadoo



Category: Narcos: Mexico (TV)
Genre: Betrayal, Introspection, M/M, Odd relationship dynamics, gay as heck
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-29
Updated: 2020-02-29
Packaged: 2021-02-28 05:29:18
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,379
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22958722
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/FreeShavocadoo/pseuds/FreeShavocadoo
Summary: Like leaves dance with the rush of cool air on a humid day, they circled around each other. Consistently parallel, close enough to know the exact direction of one another, but never quite meeting in the middle.It’s no surprise to Miguel to see Amado’s neutral expression behind faded glass in prison.It seems like a lifetime ago he’d stared at the man before him from the other side of a round table. He supposes he should’ve used the acute senses that had gotten him to that table to recognise the symbolism in it.
Relationships: Amado Carrillo Fuentes/Miguel Ángel Félix Gallardo
Comments: 20
Kudos: 44





	Joke's on you

Like leaves dance with the rush of cool air on a humid day, they circled around each other. Consistently parallel, close enough to know the exact direction of one another, but never quite meeting in the middle.

It’s no surprise to Miguel to see Amado’s neutral expression behind faded glass in prison.

It seems like a lifetime ago he’d stared at the man before him from the other side of a round table. He supposes he should’ve used the acute senses that had gotten him to that table to recognise the symbolism in it.

A round table has no head of the table, as it is made with equality in mind.

Miguel Ángel Félix Gallardo did not see anyone else in that moment to be his equal, even as one by one they swept from their seats and out of the door. The door he’d lead them into when he’d proposed what was then a radical idea, the beginnings of an empire.

Julius Caesar, indeed.

Amado had certainly been the knife he hadn’t expected, but by this point the blanket had been pulled down from Miguel’s head so he could stare into the man’s eyes properly.

At the moment of betrayal, they’d been clouded with the smoke drifting through the air, shimmering vaguely with the reflection of his whiskey glass. Miguel couldn’t tell then if it had been hard for him, and even retrospectively he flits between imagining the glimmering in Amado’s eyes as regret or contempt.

Perhaps it was both.

He lowers himself to sit without a word, without breaking eye-contact. It reminds him vaguely of the tiger on the humid night of his birthday, pacing back and forth with eyes that seemed to notice all movement. He notices Amado’s fingers twitch as he picks up the phone, his own eyes staring intently at Miguel’s.

Perhaps Miguel revels in taking his time to lift his hand, fingers dancing around the phone before finally placing it beside his ear, eyes narrowing.

Amado doesn’t seem deterred, but that’s hardly a surprise.

His biggest mistake hadn’t been assuming he knew Amado too well, but instead, denying the possibility that the man would lose faith in Miguel. He’d become complacent in his struggle for the grand vision that everyone else was too short-sighted to see.

He doesn’t doubt that Amado remained one of the few who’d appreciated Miguel’s building of the bigger picture, but unlike Miguel, Amado remained grounded, ‘Lord of the skies’ or not.

“You look like shit.”

Miguel huffs, a bitter laugh escaping his mouth. Typical Amado.

“Can’t say you’re looking to good,” Miguel’s fingers dance around the phone and Amado’s eyes flicker to the movement, “if you’re _here_.”

“As usual, as of late,” Amado’s eyes flit back towards Miguel’s own, startlingly intense, “you’re wrong.”

Miguel leans back slightly, regarding Amado with curiosity, his head titled.

How wrong they’d all been to underestimate the man who’d seemed always to be the other side of the coin, when he was in fact an entity in his own right. Miguel had never been under any illusions as to the contributions Amado had made in building their empire, but he’d foolishly assumed Amado would always function as a leader.

 _Not our empire,_ Miguel thinks, _his, now._

“Not fighting over the scraps yet?” Miguel’s eyes swim dangerously darker, his mouth curling upwards, “I suppose you’re all willing to pretend for a while.”

Amado feels a stab of fear in his gut, a fear he hadn’t felt around the man in front of him for a long time. Even obscured by thick glass, Miguel’s entire demeanour is far more intense and brimming with mockery and contempt. Where he’d once had an awkwardness about his mannerisms, now he stares so ferociously at Amado, he wonders briefly if the glass would even stop him from strangling Amado through it.

“What exactly did you think would happen?” Amado leans his elbows on the table, always relaxed, even in high-stress situations.

Miguel snorts, giving him a scathing stare. “If you’re looking for me to say I didn’t think a bunch of entitled half-wits would pull the rug from under my feet, you’re correct.”

He knows he shouldn’t laugh, but before he can stop himself, Amado lets out an undignified guffaw. Maybe he’s seeing things when he thinks Miguel smirks a little, the way he used to when they’d share little glances between one another.

It’s only been a few minutes and his entire existence is flooded yet again with the presence that is Miguel Ángel, all-consuming and brimming over the edge.

“You became complacent.” Amado’s tone is light, gentle.

A deeper part of Miguel’s brain is flooded with the urge to be gentle back, to speak to Amado in the tone he used to when they were lay beside each-other, all sweat and afterglow, speaking about mundane things that left them laughing and consumed in their comfort and closeness.

He eyes the area of Amado’s neck where he knows his face fits perfectly, his miniature stature had practically made him malleable to the taller man. If he concentrates hard enough on the memories flooding his head, he swears he can hear Amado’s laughter as he pokes Miguel in the ribs, calling him a scrawny bastard as he holds him from behind.

 _Better to lock those away,_ he thinks, _my reality couldn’t be further away from that now._

He wonders for a moment if Amado knew in one of those many moments, arms circled around Miguel’s waist from behind, that he was going to betray him. He knows that Amado is likely to consider all of Miguel’s recent behaviour as a betrayal, though, so he supposes they both have a lot to answer for.

“And you’ve become….,” Miguel eyes him, not cruelly but bluntly, “ _what_ exactly?”

Eyes searching upwards and downwards, Miguel smirks once more. “Lord of the traffickers?”

Amado laughs again, though this time it is more reminiscent of the earlier stages of their relationships when they’d still been hesitant, fleeting stares and stolen kisses, all cast over in a dream-like haze.

It’s hard to look at the man before him and remember these moments. To remember a man who was repeatedly put in threatening situations, tortured alongside him, always in the dark about relevant information, then look at the man Amado now is.

The man Miguel had made him be.

Miguel doesn’t think he’d ever stopped loving Amado, but rather, he’d just assumed he had a right to Amado’s love and loyalty in return, without putting any consistency behind his own actions first.

Perhaps they were always destined to be within fingertips reach of one another, but never quite at the same ending point.

“Why are you here?” Miguel’s voice is raspier than usual, his eyes cloudy and lazier in their intensity.

Amado shrugs. “Wanted to see you, I suppose.”

“And?” Miguel stares, looking younger than Amado has ever seen him, with ruffled hair and an air of smug indifference he’d not had much when he’d known him, “you’ve seen me. Now what?”

“I don’t know.”

The finality in his tone has Miguel having to restrain himself mentally from feeling guilt or sympathy. He practically has to restrain himself physically from trying to reach out to the warmth of Amado’s calloused hands that he knows he can never touch again, and suddenly it’s as though his stomach pains are back all over again.

As usual, Amado seems to detect the minor distress on Miguel’s features, his fingers dancing across the table to the edge of the glass, even now, managing to comfort and tease Miguel in equal measure, even if his eyes are soft.

Miguel’s fingers drag to the edge of the glass as well, mirroring Amado’s movements at a torturously slow pace until their fingers both rest on the mental frame below the glass, with perfect symmetry.

Then, Amado looks at his watch and is snapped back to reality, giving Miguel one last lingering stare, fingers brushing upward on the glass, a symbolic caress of comfort.

“I’ve got to go.”

Miguel retracts his hand from the glass slowly, staring at Amado with dull eyes, until he breaks out into slightly harsh laughter, though his eyes seem lighter.

“You’ll be back.”

_It’s like you never left, after all._

**Author's Note:**

> These two had immense gay energy on the show, and to be honest, the 'betrayal' only made it even more apparent.
> 
> I love these two and their dynamic, even though in this it is obviously weirdly fractured and very back-and-forth. The ending scene in Season 2 inspired this, and I couldn't stop thinking about Amado visiting Miguel in prison every other week......
> 
> Maybe they'll be more, maybe not. I mean, there is the OT3 to think about... (Miguel/Amado/Pacho)
> 
> Let me know what you think :)


End file.
